Cuba

When President Bush suggests, as he did yesterday, that the Cuban people should rise up against their despotic leader, he conveniently ignores the fact that U.S. policy toward Cuba has done little to spur a revolt. Decades of isolation - and his administration's toughening of the policy - haven't lessened Fidel Castro's hold on power or diminished the influence of his brother Raul, now serving as the de facto president since Mr. Castro took ill a year ago. Indeed, the only Cubans who have benefited from U.S. policy are the thousands of refugees who are given a free pass to live here.

UNITED NATIONS -- President Bush announced yesterday that he planned to tighten sanctions against the military government in Myanmar and deny visas to "those responsible for egregious human-rights violations." In a speech at the United Nations, Bush focused on human rights, outlining new U.S. efforts to force the military rulers to accede to the demands of the democracy movement in the Southeast Asian nation once known as Burma. Calling on the United Nations to honor its human-rights charter, Bush turned a spotlight on efforts to overcome dictatorships in Cuba, Zimbabwe and Sudan.

HAVANA -- Everything appears to be in place for the Orioles' historic visit to Cuba. Major League Baseball officials arrived on Thursday. Orioles owner Peter Angelos and his entourage flew in yesterday afternoon.The only thing missing is the team, which is scheduled to arrive on a charter flight tonight after facing the New York Mets in an exhibition game at Port St. Lucie.The Orioles will be greeted by Cuban officials at Jose Marti International Airport and attend an official function later in the evening.

It's not enough that Cuba trounced the Orioles on the baseball field. Now a delegation of Baltimore health experts has returned from a three-day tour praising the Cuban health system, saying that the Communist nation has achieved better measures of public health than Baltimore for much less money."

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- Catcher Julio Vinas' microscopic chances for a spot on the Orioles' Opening Day roster ended yesterday when he was reassigned to the club's minor-league camp in Sarasota, Fla.He has experienced worse. The disappointment of being asked to travel across the state hardly compared to last weekend's ambivalence over accompanying the team to a place his parents once fled."It's been an interesting few days," Vinas said.Vinas' plight was largely overshadowed among the anticipation and hype surrounding the Orioles' historic two-day trip to Cuba and Sunday's 3-2 exhibition win against a team of Cuban all-stars.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- The Orioles may write the next chapter in the history of sports diplomacy when they visit Havana for an exhibition game on March 28, but their international goodwill mission isn't meeting with universal approval.Soon after Major League Baseball officially announced yesterday that a deal had been reached to stage the home-and-home exhibition series with a team of Cuban all-stars, demonstrators representing several anti-Castro groups converged on the Orioles' Fort Lauderdale spring-training complex in an attempt to dissuade the club from visiting the communist nation.

New SUVs, trucks protect passengers and the environmentTom Horton's May 15 article, "Down with sport utility vehicles," misrepresents the emissions levels of current SUVs and light trucks and could lead consumers to make purchasing decisions hazardous to their health.His assertion that 65 million light trucks produce higher emissions than 120 million cars is not supported. The fact is that late-model cars and light trucks, especially those built since 1994, are already low-emission vehicles, with emissions of major pollutants reduced more than 90 percent from earlier vehicles.

WASHINGTON -- With time slipping away for the Orioles to arrange a pair of exhibition games with a Cuban all-star team, the United States and the Castro government are still divided by a wall of mistrust.For both governments, the games are less about baseball than about the relationship between the Cuban and American people. Neither side wants the other to gain too much of a public relations advantage.Little has happened to advance the games since Jan. 29, when Orioles owner Peter Angelos and representatives from Major League Baseball met at the White House with Samuel R. Berger, the president's national security adviser.

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba -- Both the beer and popcorn were green on St. Patrick's Day at the Bayview Club, not far from a huge outdoor cinema where several dozen sailors sat under the stars watching Mel Gibson play a con man in "Payback."A few miles away, U.S. Marines, two to a watchtower, listened through the night for Fidel Castro's Frontier Brigade while watching for would-be exiles in the minefields.Over at the enlisted members' Lateral Hazard bar, an unmistakable wail lured a sailor's wife to the dance floor.

THE TRADE DEAL between the United States and Communist Vietnam, negotiated for three years and initialed by negotiators in Hanoi last weekend, would bring the economic Cold War nearer to its end.While this trade deal will face searching scrutiny in Congress, it represents a tremendous breakthrough, following diplomatic recognition, in relations with a former enemy more than a quarter-century after a bitter war.Details are not yet public; however, any such...

Progress toward a thaw in U.S.-Cuban relations gained unexpected momentum Friday as leaders of the two countries signaled a willingness to open potentially historic talks on issues that have bitterly divided them since the days of the Cold War. President Barack Obama called for a "new beginning" with the island nation, capping a surge of gestures fed by Cuban President Raul Castro's declaration Thursday that his country "could be wrong" about its approach...

WASHINGTON -President Barack Obama is permitting unlimited travel and transfer of money by Cuban-Americans to their relatives in Cuba and sponsoring greater telecommunications with the island, while keeping a long-standing U.S. embargo against trade with Cuba in place. The State, Treasury and Commerce departments will lift "all restrictions" on the visits of family members to Cuba and remittances of money, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday. This "series of steps ... to reach out to the Cuban people" is intended to "help bridge the gap between divided Cuban families," Gibbs said, and in turn promote greater freedom and human rights in the communist nation.

ARTS Cuba's art movement The contemporary art movement in Cuba will be the subject of a discussion and talk featuring curator Ana Joa and photographer Vince Gragg from 2 p.m.-4 p.m. Sunday at Galerie Myrtis, 2224 N. Charles St. The talk is held in connection with the current show at the gallery, Cuba: The Island and Its People, which runs through Jan. 11. Go to galeriemyrtis.com. FILM 'One Foot In the Grave' Boasting influences that range from the classic Hammer horror films featuring Christopher Lee to a pompous writing instructor, director Chris LaMartina, homegrown Baltimore horror specialist, has scheduled the debut of One Foot In the Grave tomorrow night at the Creative Alliance.

On October 24, 2008, CHESTER L. Friends may call at the CHATMAN-HARRIS FUNERAL HOME, 5240 Reisterstown Road, Thursday, 1 to 8 P.M. (the family will be present 6 to 8 P.M.). Funeral services will be held at Gough U.M. Church, 14200 Cuba Road, Cockeysville, MD, Friday, wake 10:30 A.M.; funeral 11 A.M. Interment church cemetery.

Cuba, a 7-year-old horse sired in Maryland and bred in New Jersey, took the lead coming out of the far turn of the Jim McKay Maryland Million Classic yesterday and outraced Diamond David and defending champion Evil Storm down the stretch for a four-length victory in the feature race of a card at Laurel Park restricted to offspring of Maryland stallions. Nearly 22,000 showed up at Laurel for the 23rd running of what is considered Maryland's second-most important race day next to the Preakness, and $2.96 million was wagered at the track and elsewhere.

MIAMI - Hurricane Ike ripped through central Cuba yesterday, toppling colonial landmarks and forcing the evacuation of nearly 1 million people - with more likely to be displaced as the powerful storm plowed toward populous Havana. Revolutionary leader Fidel Castro proclaimed his country on "combat alert" against the third large storm to hit the island in as many weeks and what he portrayed as a heartless double standard that blocks U.S. humanitarian aid. The extent of Ike's damage elsewhere in the Caribbean emerged yesterday, a day after it ravaged Turks and Caicos and the Bahamas as a Category 4 hurricane with winds of 135 mph and triggered more flooding in devastated Haiti, where the deaths from a series of storms were said to exceed 1,000.

BEIJING - Once upon a time, they were international baseball's Big Red Machine, unbeaten for 10 years in international play and winners of more than 150 consecutive tournament games. But Cuba's national team has fallen on hard times recently. Last fall, they lost to the Netherlands in the preliminary round of the World Cup, marking the first time a European team had beaten Cuba in Cup play. Then, five days later, they lost to the U.S. in the gold medal game for the first time in their history.

On June 13, 2008, MILDRED ELIZABETH. Friends may call at THE CHATMAN- HARRIS FUNERAL HOME, 5240 Reisterstown Road, Wednesday, 1-8 p.m., where the family will be present from 6-7 p.m. The family will receive friends, Thursday 11:30 a.m. at the Gough U.M. Church, 14200 Cuba Road, Cockeysville, MD. Funeral services will begin at 12 p.m. Interment Gough U.M. Church Cemetery

Margo Miley Memorial contributions can be made to the Alzheimer's Association, 1850 York Road, Suite D, Timonium, MD. 21093. A Memorial Service will be held at the Catholic Community of St. Francis Xavier, 13717 Cuba Road in Hunt Valley, Maryland 21030 on Friday June 6th. at 10:00 A.M.

Margo Miley Memorial contributions can be made to the Alzheimer's Association, 1850 York Road, Suite D, Timonium, MD. 21093. A Memorial Service will be held at the Catholic Community of St. Francis Xavier, 13717 Cuba Road in Hunt Valley, Maryland 21030 on Friday June 6th. at 10:00 A.M.